Be alert to North Korea but not alarmed

Arms and the men . . . the rhetoric from Kim Jong-un’s and his regime has reached heights of hysteria
Photo: Reuters

Pyongyang is as strange a place as you ­will ever find. On the two occasions I visited ­the North Korean capital, I arrived there at dusk. Driving into the city was an eerie experience. For a start, there was no traffic. North Koreans simply can not afford cars. And then there was the dark. There were no street lights and the austere Soviet-style apartment buildings were unlit. There were no neon signs advertising shops, offices or consumer products. It was just dark.

The guest house had a 1970s TV with one channel: the government channel. It showed mass dancing and singing, speeches by officials and dreary concerts. No outside news penetrated the gloom.

Then there were the people. There weren’t any crowds but the few people out and about in Pyongyang were small and thin. This is, after all, a country where up to 40 per cent of children are said to suffer from malnutrition. But the Russian-built subway system was as magnificent as any I have seen. In each of the stations there were huge mosaics proclaiming the triumph of the workers’ revolution and the achievements of North Korea’s first leader, Kim Il-sung.

The meetings with the president, the foreign minister and other worthy officials were polite and formalised. At times they were lively as we argued about the country’s nuclear and missile programs. But if there was one thing which struck me, it was the near obsession of public officials with the issue of the reunification of the Korean Peninsula.

Mind you, I was discomfited by the fact that on getting into the car after meeting the president I ripped the seat of my trousers. It said it all. Things were not going well.

These days, there’s a new, enigmatic leader,
Kim Jong-un
, and the regime’s rhetoric has reached heights of hysteria not heard since the 1950s. The proclamation of war with South Korea and the US is astonishing and alarming. It begs two questions: why are they doing it and should we take it seriously?

The North Koreans seem to have been driven into incandescent rage by the United Nations Security Council decision to impose fresh sanctions in the wake of North Korea’s latest nuclear test. That’s what’s triggered the latest outbursts.

Behind this rhetoric and Pyongyang’s nuclear program lies regime survival. The South is massively richer than the North. South Korea’s GDP is over $1 trillion, the North’s is $40 billion. That is a huge difference. And although North Korea is said to have an army of two million soldiers, its defence spending is about $8 to $9 billion whereas South Korea spends around $30 billion a year on defence.

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So on that basis, North Korea’s nuclear weapons program may give the regime a sense of security. So too do its thousands of missiles directed towards the South Korean capital, Seoul. Drawing attention to the North’s huge armoury and firepower reminds the world not to mess with Pyongyang. That’s the plan.

Remember, for all Koreans the reunification of Korea is their ultimate objective. We may know South Korea will not launch a sudden attack on the North but the North Koreans don’t share our confidence. They should.

But there are two considerations worth reflecting on. If North Korea ever did use nuclear weapons against the South or the Americans, many people would die. But so would the North Korean regime.
Colin Powell
, the former US Secretary of State – not a man known for extreme language – once said to me, “Alex, if North Korea ever uses a nuclear weapon we’ll turn that place into a parking lot".

Then there is China. Once the US and ­its allies intervened in the Korean War in the early 1950s, the North Korean invasion of the South was quickly turned back. North Korea would have been overwhelmed had it not been for the intervention of the Chinese.

Think about it: if North Korea attacks the South, they can only do so with the support of China. Otherwise it would be a suicide mission. And it is unimaginable that China would want to risk a major war with the US in north-east Asia in the interests of the eccentric regime in Pyongyang. In 1950, Stalin gave North Korea the green light to invade the South. These days, no one will.

This blood-curdling rhetoric is just that, rhetoric. But take it seriously, because in human affairs people can miscalculate. The North Koreans might just overreach. If the Americans or, more likely, the South Koreans start to panic and make an excessive move, then the North in turn could overreact. That is unlikely but it is possible. That’s why Kim Jong-un’s excessive rhetoric is dangerous. In the words of one of our time-worn slogans: be alert but not alarmed.